


(Not) A Beast

by lunacosas



Series: Gladiators, Slaves & Tears [1]
Category: The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher (Video Game), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types, Wiedźmin | The Witcher Series - Andrzej Sapkowski
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ancient Rome, Anal Sex, Ancient Rome, Crying, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Dehumanization, Emetophobia, Gladiators, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mild Blood, Non-Consensual Touching, Non-Consensual Voyeurism, Objectification, Oral Sex, POV Eskel (The Witcher), Painful Sex, Past Rape/Non-con, Rape, Rape Aftermath, Rough Sex, Slavery, Spit As Lube, Vomiting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-02
Updated: 2021-01-02
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:13:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28498863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lunacosas/pseuds/lunacosas
Summary: Gladiators are used to provide entertainment outside of the arena, often chosen to fight or fuck for the entertainment of their lanista and his guests, or whored out to well-paying visitors.Eskel, for his ugliness, is chosen to ruin Julian's beauty.
Relationships: Eskel & Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, Eskel/Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, Eskel/Jaskier | Dandelion
Series: Gladiators, Slaves & Tears [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2088663
Comments: 18
Kudos: 92





	(Not) A Beast

**Author's Note:**

> Firstly, I love Eskel so goddamn much and I hate my summary because Eskel is beautiful beyond belief.
> 
> Secondly, please **READ THE TAGS & WARNINGS**. If this isn't your thing, or it starts affecting you badly as you're reading, close the tab.
> 
> Thirdly... how is this my first fic of 2021? I have softer/sweeter WIPs so one of those will be posted next, but there was a very inspiring conversation on discord that really helped me to fall back into ancient Rome AU stuff.
> 
> Emetophobia warning: there’s a passing, non-graphic mention of Eskel being sick towards the end.
> 
> A lil' glossary:  
> Cithara (kithara) - a type of stringed instrument, regarded as more beautiful than the lute (which was seen as a more common instrument)  
> Dominus - master/owner  
> Lanista - owner of a ludus  
> Ludus - gladiator school  
> Praetor - Roman official who, amongst other things, organises games  
> Retiarius - a type of gladiator that fights with a net and trident  
> Subligaculum - a loincloth worn by gladiators

They are silent during the preparations. They know what comes next, inasmuch as that they are to provide entertainment. The manner of the entertainment is subject to their dominus’ whims, or the desires of his guests. A long evening might be spent standing, waiting to be used and returned to line, or they might be pitted against each other, to fight or to fuck, as takes the fancy of whoever has been gifted command of them. Eskel has no preference for what happens next, because all of it is an exercise in pain and humiliation. The pain he can tolerate, the humiliation of being a plaything he cannot. He does not look up to meet the eyes of his brothers as he slips oiled fingers between his thighs, working them into himself. There is no guarantee that whoever might fuck him would take the time to offer him such consideration.

Scented, and dressed only in subligaculum, they are all led up into the villa. The cool stone steps give way to ornate tiles, Geralt’s feet before him and Lambert’s close behind. It weighs heavy on his heart that Geralt is most likely to be selected, thanks to his unique colouring, and that Lambert’s barely restrained fury and disgust make him an attractive choice for the more sadistic guests. Lambert never recovers well from these evenings, and Geralt seems to lose yet another piece of himself each time. Eskel feels there is little left of himself to lose. He does what he does because he has to, and tries to harden himself against the experience. Like all things, he reminds himself it will end.

This evening, their dominus is entertaining a praetor. It is a private occasion, accompanied by graceful music and an overflowing of food and wine. The realisation that this is a private showing sinks like a cold stone through Eskel, although he takes care to give nothing away. Obediently, he takes his place, faces forward, and smothers the longing to reach out to Lambert, whose posture is screaming unease.

As they stand, their dominus steps forward, guiding his guest. The praetor is in his forties, with dark, curly hair packed close to his skull, cheeks and nose permanently ruddied by wine. His cold, narrow eyes glitter with cruel interest as he surveys his options, and with a word to the lanista, Eskel and the others are made to strip naked.

Fifteen gladiators of the ludus Lentulus are presented to him, and yet the praetor takes a step back after a moment, seeming uninterested.

“Bring the boy,” he commands.

“Julian! Come here.”

The music stops, the musician setting aside the cithara and doing as he’s told. Even from several paces away, Eskel can see out of the corner of his eye how uneasy the young man is as he forces himself forward. His face is sickly pale, his hands wrung together and then abruptly dropped as he lowers his gaze in obedience. He is new here. Eskel has not seen him before.

“Yes…” the praetor murmurs. “Yes, he will do. And I think…”

He returns to the line of gladiators, a malicious smirk twisting his mouth up at one side. He walks along the line, appraising the options.

When he reaches Eskel, the smirk becomes a foul grin, beady eyes beset with cruel delight. “What a barbarous cock. How hideous! And what a face! Are you sure this is a man, and not a beast?”

The praetor laughs at his own words, and Eskel stares fixedly at the spot he’d chosen upon entering the room. He knows his face is twisted, knotted and scarred from the angled rake of a Retiarius’ trident. Most usually recoil from him, and pass him by in favour of more attractive options.

“He will do,” the praetor decides, and in the moment he and the lanista divert their attention, Eskel looks towards the musician.

The young man is staring, wide-eyed and afraid, at him. Eskel wishes he could comfort him, give any reassurance possible, but there is no room to speak, no chance to apologise for what is about to happen. He can tell the musician knows what is to come, and perhaps has suffered it before. It would be unsurprising, given his exceptional beauty.

The rest of the gladiators are sent out, and Eskel reaches for the place he always hides himself at times like this, the part of his mind he retreats to in order to survive the twisted games he’s forced to play. He will do what he has to, because he must, and suppresses a flinch as the praetor comes closer, grabbing his cock.

“How absolutely vile,” he breathes, reeking of sweetened wine and game. He looks delighted, his soft, pudgy hand stroking Eskel.

Eskel exhales, shivering as he tries to give in to the touch, to allow it to bring him to hardness. With the Roman so close, it is difficult. With the words he says, it is almost impossible.

“I bet he can’t wait to fuck such a pretty thing, can he?” To the praetor, he is nothing more than an object, a tool. “Look at him, beast.”

Eskel is made to look at the young man, his beautiful, soft brown hair falling into frightened blue eyes, his trembling body loosely dressed in the finest cloth a slave may wear.

“I’ll wager he’s never touched anything so beautiful before,” the praetor continues, addressing his host. “He should thank me! Tonight is his lucky night.”

Eskel grits his teeth, his cock twitching feebly.

“Boy!”

“Go to him,” the lanista orders the musician. The young man – Julian – nearly trips over his own feet. It takes every fibre of his being to force himself to obey, to come closer to the monster that is going to violate him.

“Put those pretty hands to good use.”

The praetor withdraws, stepping backwards, his greedy stare on them as Julian shuffles within touching distance. His palm is damp, his fingertips calloused from the strings of the instruments he plays as he touches Eskel’s cock, and his hand shakes, weaker than Eskel knows it must be. With two pairs of eyes upon them, there is nothing Eskel can do or say to reach out and directly comfort or reassure the musician. He is sure his comfort would not be welcome anyway.

Instead, he closes his eyes and exhales softly, relaxing as much as he can in such a situation to try to show Julian that he is tame to touch. The praetor thinks Eskel is nothing more than a mindless creature, and that he ought to consider himself lucky. In light of such an assumption, Eskel weighs up just how far he can go, how much he can show. Perhaps he is expected to break, to push and force Julian’s touch, weak to it, snapping like a wild animal. He will not do that. He will perform his role, and next to nothing more.

The most he allows, in the distance between them, is a subtle, hopefully imperceptible shift of his hips. He lets his breathing falter and shudder, an act for Julian that he hopes is taken kindly, as a show of what little humanity he is allowed.

“Come into the centre of the room,” their dominus calls, and both he and his guest retire to sofas set by a low table overflowing with food and drink.

Julian and Eskel separate, Eskel’s cock still only semi-hard. Careful not to notice anything around him, or to think too hard about their lecherous audience, he moves as he is told. Julian, still trembling, follows, his head bowed.

“Your beauty isn’t enough to rouse him,” the praetor laughs, and Julian withers even further. “Use your mouth.”

With heaviness, Julien sinks to his knees, and Eskel’s stomach twists. Gaze still lowered, Julian parts his lips as he leans forward, dipping just enough to catch the head of Eskel’s cock in his mouth.

And fuck, his mouth is as beautiful as the rest of him. His rosy lips close around Eskel, his breathing coming hard and the trembling still gripping him as he sucks softly, almost tentatively. Eskel lets out an unbidden shudder, his breathing fractured as Julian takes more of him in his mouth, his tongue catching the underside of his cock. He cannot help reacting, his cock swelling and stiffening, and Julian stills for a moment, holding Eskel carefully in his mouth.

Without meaning to, Eskel reaches out to touch him. The angle of their bodies permits the gesture to hopefully go unnoticed, to keep the way Eskel’s thumb brushes a small, gentle circle against Julian’s shoulder from being seen.

It causes Julian to relax. Outwardly, he seems much the same, his eyes closed and body trembling, but Eskel feels the soft, gentle breath he lets out, and the way his tongue moves with confidence. He pulls back, and this time when he moves forward again he pushes Eskel’s foreskin back with his lips, his tongue flicking against the head and nearly causing him to moan. Eskel’s touch remains against Julian’s cool skin, relief making itself known as he feels the way Julian sucks far more confidently, yet still slowly, at his now almost hard cock. Julian is practiced. He has had experience with men before, although Eskel imagines it was never forced. Whichever household he came from, Eskel prays to the gods he may return there, or to somewhere similarly kind. This ludus is no place for him.

He does not dare move, but his fingers tremble of their own accord, Eskel’s breathing faltering as Julian does something sublime with his mouth. His reaction makes Julian look up. Breathtaking blue eyes, deeper than the ocean and vaster than the sky, lock with his own, something nameless passing between them. Eskel sees it, sees the way Jaskier shifts from unease to peace, unafraid of him, accepting, unbothered by the twist of scarring he so clearly sees.

It tears him apart that he is going to cause Julian such pain.

Julian looks away in that moment, faltering, his breathing hitching. Eskel fears what he saw, what caused the change, because he feels Julian shudder.

“I think that’s enough,” the praetor calls out, and Eskel fights to level himself again. “Kneel, boy. Let the ugly brute mount you.”

The ugly brute. Eskel tries to let the blow glance off him as he would any other. He wishes he had not looked at Julian, that he had not touched him, because the moment of weakness is costing him now. His thoughts are harder to control, his heart left open to the barbs lacing the praetor’s words, the unkindness in his tone. He is a beast, a monster, a hideous thing. He is fit for one purpose, and one purpose alone: violence.

Julian looks up at him again, his mouth still around Eskel’s cock, and Eskel sees that his eyes are damp with tears. His expression is pained, the last press of his tongue against Eskel’s cock a gentle caress that feels almost like an apology, not an accidental or perfunctory touch as he pulls away. The moment is awful.

As Julian pulls off and turns around, he is clearly fighting back sobs. The laughter his distress causes echoes around them, crushing Eskel as he kneels, trying to keep his touch gentle as he parts Julian’s cheeks. There is no oil. None is called for or brought, there is none to hand. Julian, a house slave and musician, is not prepared for this. This is going to hurt.

“Has he forgotten how to fuck?” the praetor snorts.

“He is quite dim-witted,” his dominus laughs.

There is only so long Eskel can remain hard like this, the briefest of windows in which he can do what is expected of him. Unhappy beyond measure, he performs his task. The only advantage he has is that Julian’s spit still coats the upper part of his cock, but even that will not be enough. He takes himself in hand and lines up, eyes squeezed shut as he hopes to all the gods he knows that he is the greatest unkindness Julian will ever have to know in life. He is going to be hell for him anyway.

The sound Julian makes as he pushes in is awful. His breath seizes in his lungs, a mewl escaping him before fracturing into wet, broken sobs. Eskel has barely entered him, and can feel Julian tightening around his cock, his body trying to reject what is happening even as Julian fights to relax. The weight of his abhorrence bearing down on him, Eskel goes as slowly as he dares, and does not push his full length in, but he cannot stop. He is expected to perform, to live up to his barbarity, to break the beautiful man thrown before him. He tries to apologise with the little circles his thumb rubs, hidden from view, on Julian’s hip. It is like a drop in the ocean, a whisper in a storm, but there is nothing else Eskel is allowed to give as he pulls out again so that he can push forward. He has no idea if Julian even feels his touch, given how lost he must be in pain, how badly he trembles with the brutality of what is happening. Eskel plans to feign completion as soon as he feels he can, if he can last long enough to make it seem real. He is no stranger to being directed either, being instructed what to do, so the pace he sets is slow enough that he can increase it without causing even greater misery.

Beneath him, Jaskier begins to sob freely. It is sickening to be the cause of it, the reason for his pain and misery. Eskel knows he has to stop thinking, has to stop feeling. He is going soft already, too lost in disgust at what he is doing. His dominus’ displeasure at failure to perform was a lesson hard learned, and the threat of drawing his ire on them both is the kick Eskel needs. With one last, unforgiving look at what he is, he lets go.

He is not kind. He fucks Jaskier, using the full length of his cock, pushing into him with increasing speed, fingers biting into delicate skin to hold the musician’s hips steady. He squeezes his eyes shut so tight he sees stars, lets his control over his body loosen and instinct take over. That he has it within him to do this is abhorrent beyond all power of description, and the words of the praetor echo in his mind, a foul, mocking chorus to the sickening sounds of skin against skin mingled with the musician’s cries and sobs. He is everything he has been called, and more. Vile. Hideous. Ugly brute. Barbarian. Monster. Beast.

Worst of all, he has not gone soft. He remains hard, his breathing becoming laboured, his skin prickling with sweat in the warm evening air. He fucks until he has had his fill, chasing the thin, fragile sliver of base pleasure he can find until he comes with a groan. He befouls the beautiful man who deserves nothing of this – not of this villa, of Eskel, not of this accursed country – and then fights desperately to school his features and keep from emptying his stomach.

He hides his face, bowing his head as he waits for dismissal. The ringing in his ears leaves him barely able to hear anything but the awful, wrecked gasps Julian is making. Julian…

Body slaves are called to tend to Julian. He is helped up, and brought closer to where the praetor is seated. The twisted man inspects him, and is perhaps satisfied, perhaps not. Either way, he is guided from the room and Eskel is dismissed. He withdraws, collecting his subligaculum, and another slave leads him back down to the ludus itself. He is greeted by the smell of sand and sweat, the familiar, lingering tang of metal against metal. The gate is closed behind him, freeing him from the crumbling restraint that held him together.

He makes it two paces before he begins to shake, trembling like a newborn and losing the contents of his stomach. A cry goes up, and he hears someone rushing towards him. Geralt’s scent wraps around him just as the other gladiator’s arms do, supporting his weight.

“Hey,” Geralt says gently, “it’s over now. It’s over.”

He strokes Eskel’s hair, kissing his brow.

“I’m a monster,” Eskel breathes, and realises that he is crying, sobbing as he turns his face into Geralt’s shoulder. “I… I…”

More kisses are pressed to his head, Geralt murmuring softly as he guides him away from the gate. “None of that now. Come, let’s clean up. This way.”

He lets himself be guided, too fragmented to function alone. Geralt leads him to where they all readied for the evening, where the oil and cleaning things are still set out. There is a basin of water too, and Geralt takes a cloth in hand, wetting it and wiping at Eskel’s filthied skin. Eskel has to turn away, unable to cope with seeing the water turn pink, and then red.

“He was so beautiful,” he hears himself say, his chest heaving and shuddering. “And I…”

Geralt says nothing. There is nothing to say. He knows. They all know.

“I’m a monster.”

“No.” Geralt’s tone is firm, his hand pressing firmly against Eskel’s shoulder. “You’re not.”

“Look at me,” Eskel breathes, barely able to stand himself. He fears what it was Julian must have seen, how horrible and terrible he appeared to him. “How can you say I’m not?”

Geralt reaches up to gently hold his face, rough fingers brushing against deep scars and wiping away a tear. “Because I have eyes to see,” he says. “And because I know you are a good man, Eskel. A kind man.”

“What I did was not kind.”

“What you did was not your choice.”

Eskel bows his head, resigned as he exhales. Geralt is right. It does not make his actions any easier to bear.

“Would you like to train?” Geralt offers. His hands resume their careful task of scraping oil from Eskel’s skin.

He shakes his head. “To rest,” he decides.

Geralt nods, and silence falls around them until they are done. “Let’s go.”

Securing his subligaculum back in place, Eskel follows Geralt back to their shared cell. The door is left open behind them, letting the night air circulate as best it can as they settle down on Geralt’s pallet. It is almost too warm to remain in Geralt’s arms, yet neither of them make any move to pull away. Eskel kisses Geralt’s arm in thanks as a little of his strength returns to him, his thoughts shifting with fervent prayer to Julian. He prays the beautiful young man will be okay, that he will recover from what Eskel has done to him and be safe from all such things in the future. He prays that they never have to meet again in this life, unless it is with Julian holding in his hand the means of retribution. Eskel would welcome that. He would welcome it with open arms, because, in this life, being sorry is never enough.

**Author's Note:**

> My original note for this has 'all/Jaskier' so there might be more. I'm also tempted to write this from Jaskier's POV because there's a moment when he looks up at Eskel and realises he's no monster, he's just as trapped in this as Jaskier is.


End file.
